Sins of the Flesh
by SPG inc
Summary: Nassir Amit leads the Flesh Tearers to rescue outmatched Space Wolves from the World Eaters and to atone for a past crime. But as the War Lord Tarugar seeks to create a champion of Khorne for himself, what cost may Amit have to pay for atonement?
1. Chapter 1

_**Third Warhammer fic I've conceived- first one I've published. Sequel to Flesh of Cretacia, prequel to Chosen of Khorne. Rights reserved to Games Workshop et al. Enjoy!**_

**Sins of the Flesh**

The conflict did justice to the names of those who participated, as the terrible war band forged of flesh held as stubbornly as tempered steel against the bloody talons of the tearers of flesh. Nassir Amit grimly reflected on this dehumanising overview of him and his warriors, though Amit and his men had long since been elevated to something far more than human.

'_Or perhaps less,'_ Amit caught himself thinking. He admonished himself- a chapter master had no right to allow himself such weak minded musings, even if they were the symptoms of a sickness in the heart- a wound that had never healed.

"**Fifty metres! Contact imminent!"**

The crackle over the vox brought a slight smile to his lips. The one saving grace of that ancient wound was that the balm that could soothe the pain was simple to acquire and administer.

"Flesh Tearers!" Nassir Amit, former fifth captain of the Blood Angels, now commander of the chapter bearing his own honorific as a title "Attack at will! For the Blood, and the Emperor!"

At the command, two ranks of adeptus astartes clad in battle tarnished red and black war gear broke into a near maniac charge towards the enemy. War cries and bloodthirsty roars alike tangled in the air and the ground shook beneath the impact of power armoured feet. A few half-hearted sprays of bolter fire added to the din, but the Flesh Tearers favoured close combat above all else, and the hiss of power weapon ignitions and the screams of chainblade motors drowned out all else in the final moment before the two forces met.

Confronting the Flesh Tearers were the sullied ranks of the Flesh Forged- a barely unified rabble of mutated horrors that had once been the population of Hippocampus. Leading the charge was the Hippocampus Equinaar Rough Riders. Amit had seen many terrible enemies in his violent lifetime, but the former allies from the ranks of the Imperial Guard he now faced were so depraved as to almost have him recoiling. The riders and their war chargers had been corrupted by vile sorceries to become single creatures; a blending of man and mount that violated the proud heritage of the soldiers of Hippocampus and the nobility of the equinaars. The things now sported human bodies from the waist up spouting from behind the equinaar heads in a berserk parody of mythological centaurs. Many were missing the lower halves of their arms, riding lances stabbing out from elbows in their place. The flesh of these hideous things was mottled and scabbed, showing coloured patterns that indicated where uniforms and saddles had been subsumed to become part of the twisted bodies. The horde brayed and barked in a crazed frenzy that sounded neither human nor animalistic. The long faces of the beasts of burden sported eyes that wept blood and maws with whipping tongues, disjointed fangs or spiked muzzles that had been welded into place. Some of the human faces had their eyes scratched out, the guardsmen unable to bare the sight of what they'd become. They were the forces of disorder, driven insane by their ordeal and lost to primal rage. Whether they had been willing in their mutation or not, there was no hope for them now other than the Emperor's mercy, and the Flesh Tearers were there to grant it.

The Flesh Forged hit the astartes, knocking a handful of them back with a few lucky impacts. A fellow two strides away from Nassir Amit reeled for a moment as a riding lance pieced his neck. The space marine rallied quickly, snapping the weapon off where it connected to the freak's body and counterattacking with a back hand slash of his flaying knife. The chapter master had no time to make sure his warrior was not too badly injured, for another rough rider hybrid was baring down on him.

The monster thundered towards Amit, strips of meat swinging from its body where stretched ribs stabbed out like clawed fingers. A snub-nosed cap of metal over the beast's mouth with a spiked tip thrust forward to stab the chapter master to death. Amit sidestepped and punched the creature's chest with one of his massive gauntleted hands, robbing it of momentum in an instant. The remains of a guardsman loomed over him next from the equinaar's body, waving an axe that would normally have been used by domestic emergency services. Amit drew his own weapons in response- a pair of rust red chaintonfas, chipped and scared by centuries of hard use. Gripping the handles so that the blades ran down the length of his forearms, Chapter Master Amit swiped at the falling axe. It disappeared in a flash of whirring teeth, along with most of his assailant's arm. Before the mutant could react again, Amit leapt up onto it, grabbing the equinaar potion by what was left of its oily mane and allowing the teeth of his left tonfa to bite into the human segment. The monster tottered for a moment but couldn't hold the weight of the fully armoured form. It collapsed, and Amit used the jolt of the impact to force his weapon down. The chain blade ripped the human thorax to pieces, and the mount shuddered and died with its intrinsically attached rider.

Leaping to his feet, Amit turned to face the next mutant who was charging him at speed. With practiced ease he spun the tonfas so they were pointing outward and lurched aside, falling to one knee so that he could swing his hungry blade into the front fetlocks of the malformed stallion. The front of the beast collapsed and it tumbled past Amit and into the second rank of Flesh Tearers. All around him his warriors were engaging the enemy, suffering minor injuries but not falling to the mutants. Amit pressed on, too carried away with the bloodshed to stop and oversee the progress of the three squads under his direct command. If he felt any guilt or shame at his refusal to act like a commander at the expense of combat, it was drowned out by the thrill that came with the boundless violence. He revelled in it, fighting on with even more vigour as the blood began to flow in earnest. His fellow Flesh Tearers followed suit, barely maintaining a disciplined fighting line as they were carried away with bloodlust. The Flesh Forged outnumbered them four to one, but even their insanity driven frenzy was no match for the astartes' capacity for violence. In less than two minutes the skirmish was over.

Bodies and body parts lay strewn in a long stripe where the horrors had confronted the space marines. The combatants had been butchered so fiercely that it looked as if they'd descended to a new level of depravity, mutating into even more appalling shapes. The smell of fouled blood was repugnant. Nevertheless, Nassir Amit couldn't keep himself from inhaling the scent. The stench kept that thrill running through his body. He knew it was wrong, but that part of him inside- his wound- was always sated by blood. He felt that it would be so much better if he'd just take a moment to dip his hands in the red filth, raise it to his lips, and-

A wet thud broke the chapter master from his combat haze. A fellow astartes had found a human half of a Flesh Forged just balancing on the precipice of death, and had pounced on the opportunity to speed him on his way with his massive two handed chainsword. There was a quick reverberating buzz of the blade, and the warrior openly relished the spray of blood across his face, tainted as it was.

"I trust you don't intend to taste that blood, captain," Amit asked disapprovingly, his voice the steady rumble of an approaching storm as he ignored his own hypocrisy.

"This filth would barely whet my appetite, lord," first Captain Gabriel Seth spoke in a jovial tone that bordered on disrespectful in the face of the chapter master. "I'll wager there's finer fare ahead. What's say we go find it?"

"Hold, captain. We need time to regroup and assess the tactical situation."

"Ha!" Seth laughed absently. "Time not spent flesh tearing is time wasted."

"Remember we are here with a greater purpose in mind."

"What greater purpose is there for us beyond killing the enemy?"

Amit turned away, both angry and ashamed of the implication of such a question, though the captain had clearly meant nothing by it.

"Honour…" Amit answered, more to himself than to Seth.

"… and redemption."


	2. Chapter 2

The ocean world of Hippocampus orbited its sun alone. The lonely planet had a single small continent and little value in terms of resources other that a large number of equinaar herds. Nevertheless, it had earned the attention of the Inquisition when a dark cult had risen up in rebellion and had all but taken the planet. A vast liberation fleet had been massed in response, and were given orders to wait at their staging point in a neighbouring system. The Inquisition had strong intelligence that space craft under control of further worshipers of the ruinous powers were travelling in the direction of Hippocampus, and they planned to use the besieged world as a bait to draw in the approaching hordes in to be taken out in the liberation, refusing to send reinforcements or evacuation ships until the enemy was committed. However, when the plan was drawn up the Inquisition found themselves butting heads with a contingent Space Wolves who'd joined the liberation effort. The sons of Leman Russ, with their belligerent attitude to authority and particular contempt for the Inquisition, were disgusted with the brutal plan, and so the thirty space marines, with Wolf Lord Ikuvium Whitewolf and his pack of four Fenrisian wolves leading the charge, descended upon the planet against orders. It was after a week of hard fighting in which the Inquisition refused to commit the fleet that the chaos reinforcements arrived, and it was worse than anyone could've imagined.

The ships that arrived in system turned out to be strike cruisers in service to the twelfth legion, the World Eaters, deranged renegades who'd fallen to the insane worship of dark powers that personified bloodshed and slaughter, and they invaded Hippocampus with a horrifying swiftness. All contact was lost with the planet within hours of the World Eater's planet-fall. No civilian or Space Wolf managed to escape.

The next stage of the quickly adapted plan was to engage in a ship to ship battle with the traitors until the strike cruisers were destroyed or fled from the larger force. With the planet overrun there was no point trying to take it back without naval bombardment, and that couldn't happen until the skies were clear. Despite being outnumbered, the World Eater's strike cruisers were powerful and would make hard targets for the standard Imperial vessels. The liberation of Hippocampus was estimated to be delayed by five weeks.

However, once again the Inquisition's plan was met with defiance.

Word of the war spread quickly to the other space marine chapters, eventually reaching the Flesh Tearers. Despite having only recently settled Cretacia as their chapter home world, when Nassir Amit heard of the Space Wolves plight he led a full half of the chapter to Hippocampus, deploying via drop pod assault to relieve their stranded brothers. Such a rash move amidst both the World Eater threat and Inquisitorial scorn was seen by many as arrogance. Amit was happy to let others assume his reasons for rushing into battle, for the crime he had yet to account for that had led him to Hippocampus was a stain upon his soul, one he was forbidden to confess and yet to answer for.

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Amit studied the image thrown up by the portable hololithic display that a tech marine held before him. Even with half of the Flesh Tearers' entire chapter, his warriors were spread thin to push back the enemy on all fronts.

"Send Sergeant Janus and his squad to support Sergeant Minoan's attack on hab centre Epsilon. When it's taken they are to take positions in the upper levels and watch the roads while we advance to the far side."

"They won't like having to wait, and I don't blame them," Captain Seth said mirthfully. "Why wait when there are so many of those mutant freaks just waiting to be put out of their misery?"

Amit's first impulse was anger. But he was chapter master, and he reigned himself in, turning what would have been a furious rebuke into an impatient glare. Seth, humbled but still inappropriately jolly, left to distribute the orders, the shingle of the planet's surface crunching under the weight of his power armour. The war gear was red, like the colour of old blood, except for the shoulder pads, power plant and green lensed helm hanging from his belt, which were charcoal black. He bore the chapter symbol of a falling drop of blood in the centre of a white razorcog upon his left pauldron, and a red laurel on his helm marking his rank. On his chest was a white skull with black wings that was the mark of the first company.

"So eager to seek out the enemy as fast as possible; I would expect nothing less of my captain," a clear and steady voice drew Chapter Master Amit's attention as Sergeant Gorn materialised at his side.

"Captain Seth has my trust. I am not concerned with his impulsiveness and neither should you be."

"I mean no disrespect, and I too am anxious to spill the blood of the enemy. But so far we have only fought against the monsters that were once the inhabitants of this world. We've yet to face the traitors proper, and it is not like the World Eaters to hold back and let their underlings fight their battles. Not unless they have some greater strategy in mind."

Gorn had always been a cautious one, a rare trait among the hot tempered Flesh Tearers. Some might question how Gorn could have the audacity to speak so frankly to the chapter master, but he and Amit had fought side by side during the Great Crusade. Gorn's armour was the same as Captain Seth's aside from the absence of a captain's laurel and the presence of a cloak of onyx scales that he'd earned during the crusade when he'd purged the volcanic world Salar of a cadre of witches. Where Seth's face was drawn and creased with a bare head, Gorn's face was smooth except for a wrinkled brow- the only place where he expressed any tension- and a full head of pitch black hair.

"We cannot be sure of how the minds of our treacherous brothers work," Amit rumbled. "They denied our Emperor to worship false gods. We'd do well not to try and reason out their intentions."

Despite having fought together, the change that a life of war had wrought on Sergeant Gorn was vastly different to how it had changed Nassir Amit. The chapter master's face was a waxy blob with pale, sunken eyes and a lipless mouth that drew back to show elongated fangs. A faint brush of blond stubble on his rad burned scalp sat alongside a pale, curving scar the width of a man's palm. His body was encased in a bulked suit of terminator armour; an antique of steel and ceramite, forged on Mars during the most glorious years of the Imperium of Man. The left pauldron bore an iron cast skull emblem. The mark of the Flesh Tearers was stamped onto the right pauldron, as well as on his chest plate and left kneepad in place of a squad number. Over his head, a small icon of a winged skull rose up in dulled iron. A handful of purity seals were scattered over the war gear, and from his waist hung a studded black tabard.

Nassir Amit looked every inch his informal title- the Flesh Tearer. It was a name he'd earned during the Great Crusade. Earned, to be precise, from sworn brothers among the World Eaters who'd admired his barbaric methods of war. The bitter irony was not lost on Amit. As he looked over his handiwork on the battleground he wondered if the Guard regiments who finally reclaimed this world would blame such a massacre on the traitors, reasoning that no true son of the Emperor could be capable of such savagery. Would they burn the twisted mess with the same honour afforded all those who fell in the name of the Imperium, all the while cursing the monsters that had torn into the Hippocampus Equinaar Rough Riders so violently that they barely resembled their original forms?

"Our brothers are on their way," Captain Seth's return refocused the chapter master's thoughts. "We are the closest to the storm now, but auspex is still ineffective against it."

Seth referred to the unnatural weather system that had formed over the World Eater's landing sight shortly after their arrival, blocking sensors and preventing airborne travel in the area.

"Then we will be going in blind," Gorn concluded. "My lord, we are proceeding far faster than any other group. The threshold of that storm is less than half a league away. Even Minoan's units will take at least an hour to match us."

"We advance in a matter of minutes," Amit said firmly. "We will take the time to scout the immediate vicinity, but then we move."

"Well said, lord," Seth gave a booming laugh. "The sooner we get there, the more enemies there are for us to kill."

"We advance for honours sake, not for blood."

"Come now, my lord. Why should we deny that which we all desire? How can any Flesh Tearer resist the bloodletting of our enemies?"

Nassir Amit's head snapped round to face his first captain, eyes smouldering with anger. Seth had the good sense to look contrite and he stepped back to bow his head in submission.

"No astartes is of use to me if he allows his bloodlust to cloud his judgement." Amit stalked forward, not looking back. Gorn quickly came to his side and spoke in a hushed tone.

"Forgive me my lord, but don't you believe that maybe your desire to prove your honour might be clouding your own judgement?"

"Mind your words as you try my patience, Sergeant!"

"Lord, there has been neither word nor sign. I know of the burden you carry; remember I was with you on Signus Prime-"

"Such things are not to be spoken of. Be silent!"

"- but we cannot account for our actions now. The Space Wolves are lost."

Amit swung round. Gorn caught the fury in his eyes and stopped, but did not try to retract his words. Amit's hands tightened around his tonfas as his old wound burned in his chest, heated by Gorn's words. And as it did, another pain afflicted him- an ache in his brain this time, buried deep in his psyche. Before Signus Prime he hadn't even noticed that pain in his head, but ever since then he'd felt it, day after day. He fought it, as did every son of Sanguinius, but he still felt the desire to just stop straining against it and let himself be overcome by the pain. He knew it would clear his mind and make things so much simpler, for he'd felt its touch before. And if it touched him now, it would just be a simple matter to reach for Gorn and stop those harsh words from harming him again.

Amit caught himself. No, that was not the way. That itch in his mind may be a part of him, but his filial devotion to Sanguinius overrode it. He crushed the stray thoughts and feelings beneath his will and turned his back on the shorter space marine.

"We scout ahead. Sergeant, captain- with me. Have Sergeant Noxx take command and be ready to move when I give the order."

This time no one challenged him. Maybe his sergeant was right, and the Space Wolves were lost. But until he knew for sure he would not give up. This was the chance he had been waiting for hundreds of years for. The chance for redemption.

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The massive, jagged rock piles that lay at random intervals in the pebbled savannah blocked all passage by mechanised transport, but they made for good vantage points. A lone figure swathed in a fur rimmed cloak looked out over the rolling fields of stone from his concealment between two black boulders. He had the stance and poise of a warrior, but he represented a role far beyond that of a mere soldier.

The figure watched as the trio of space marines came his way, leaving behind the army on the horizon to scout the rocky path they'd be taking. He knew all three of them; he had seen them between the shades of wakefulness and sleep in the place hidden from the eyes of mundane beings. The one he sought was among them- there, the one in the lead. He knew his name.

The Flesh Tearer.

He was the one he needed. The enemy of his people, and the one who was now the only hope for his people. The lone figure knew all this, for he had seen the path of the Flesh Tearer's destiny- no, not destiny. Destiny would imply an on-going purpose for the son of Sanguinius, but that was not what was to happen. This was the moment; the only moment for which the approaching space marine was here for.

Fate. He had seen the Flesh Tearer's fate.


	3. Chapter 3

Nassir Amit hauled himself hand over hand up the rock pile. Seth and Gorn followed closely. All three travelled at a pace that would have broken a normal man. The space marines didn't even break sweat as they climbed.

"With respect my lord, we've come far from our brothers and are in territory suitable for an ambush. I recommend you stop here and allow me to go on ahead. It would not do for our chapter master to walk headlong into an ambush without his honour guard."

Amit was happy to ignore Gorn's words, but Seth took up his laugher again.

"Do not trouble the Flesh Tearer with your caution, brother. The honour of first blood from the traitors rightful belongs to him. Besides, we are here, and the ways of the Flesh Tearers are well suited for handling the likes of the World Eaters."

They fell silent, for which Amit was glad. The sergeant's words provoked a sense of guilt in him; even after all these years, after Signus Prime and the death of Sanguinius, he had not learned anything. Not enough to stop his reckless charge into the face of danger. And as for the captain's words- to declare the Flesh Tearers well matched with the berserkers of the twelfth legion- the symbolism of that match was unpleasant to think of. He tried to bury the thought as he had so many others, but like all of them they pricked at his mind, spiteful and accusing. And while he endured the critical echoes, that irritation in his head was there again, tempting him to relinquish himself to its power and escape the pain. He couldn't help but picture himself, free of inhibition, dropping down to the last ledge and turning to his brothers to stop there damned talk!

Amit crested the next peak, emerging onto fairly level ground. He distracted himself from his imaginings by taking in his surroundings. There were higher rocks still, some twice his height, turning the path ahead in a miniature canyon. Chapter Master Amit calculated all strategic possibilities, from the risks of ambush to the fastest way over the rocks, while his subordinates scrambled up behind him.

"A direct path will lead us to the coast, my lord," Gorn said, unnecessarily as all three of them had committed the map details to memories.

"There is nothing to be found there; it is open ground. The garrisons on the peninsulas are our targets."

"But in the shadow of that storm…" Gorn let his words hang, looking up at the edge of the roiling clouds that they were just a few steps from passing under.

"Losing your nerve, brother? What's a little rain to us?"

"Don't let your attention stray, captain," the chapter master said strictly. "This area is a prime point for an ambush."

"The enemy could never mount those rocks fast enough to swarm down on us lord, and there is nowhere else to hide," Seth strode into the mouth of the small gulley before them. "We delay ourselves with this caution, and I grow more impatient to meet the traitors by the second."

The captain approached the oddly defined edge of the storm where thin rain drops shot down onto the rocks. The water gave off an unpleasant, toxic funk. A roll of thunder throbbed above.

"See, nothing to fear!"

Seth took one step onto the wet rocks under the thunderhead, and then there was pair of deafening explosions.

No, not explosions. Just blasts- crashes- followed by the sound of guttural motors.

From either side of Captain Seth, two vast figures smashed their way through the solid rock walls and converged on the lone warrior. Gorn was half a second faster that Amit, firing his bolt pistol at the assailant on the right, giving Seth the moment he needed to rally and draw his chainsword- the Blood Reaver- to fend off an attack from the left.

As the two attackers faltered, Amit had a chance to see what they faced.

World Eaters. A pair of them in rusted black power armour stained with blood and smoke, with helmets cast with feral jaws and blazing red eyes. They were covered in studs and barbs. The one on the right had three long, needle spikes coming out the sides and top of his head. Both bore massive, double headed chainaxes.

Amit and Gorn sprang forward to aid their surrounded brother. Gorn lead with the combat shield clamped onto his forearm while his drew his own blade, but the spike headed World Eater nearly sent him tumbling as he hit the shield with a sweep of his axe.

"Captain, stay with the sergeant!" Amit ordered as he confronted the other World Eater. Seth obeyed and quickly disengaged to help Gorn while the chapter master closed with the enemy. Sensing new prey, the berserker barrelled into Amit. The Flesh Tearer's heavier armour held him in place, but he still staggered under the traitor's wild strength. Holding one tonfa along his arm's length, he swiped it over the World Eater's chest plate. The wound wasn't fatal, but it still went deep enough to draw blood. A normal space marine would have back off and gone on the defensive while they recovered themselves, but like all World Eater's, this one was driven by volatile brain implants and the smell of blood seemed to enflamed his fury all the more. He rammed into the Flesh Tearer again, pushing his axe teeth down onto his shoulder. Amit grimaced as the blades screamed next to his ear, digging a gap in his armour. He realised he'd need to change tactics if he were to defeat this one.

Allowing rage to guide his actions as well, Chapter Master Amit began slamming his fists one after the other into the traitor astartes. The blades of his tonfas never touched the space marine, but the attack was fierce enough to drive him back. However, this also meant he was in the right position to make use of his huge chainaxe.

The World Eater swung the axe in a wide arc. The spinning teeth ripped a furrow in the chapter master's cuirass. Amit snarled and stabbed out with a chaintonfa. The weapon gouged into the traitor's gut, badly wounding but not felling him, and Amit had to abandon his advantage to dodge a downward swing of the axe.

Nassir Amit observed his opponent carefully, sizing him up, predicting his next move. He heard the blood thundering in his ears and he longed to rush into attack. He forced himself to resist the urge, but it didn't leave him. He braced himself to dart beneath his enemy's guard when he next attacked and go for the opening in his armour, but with an impulsion that felt no better than the World Eater's themselves, he was desperate to fly at the foe to attack; to rip.

To tear…

And then the World Eater was dead.

Caught up in his craving for violence, Amit couldn't understand what had happen. One moment the World Eater was readying himself to charge; the next his head just seemed to implode, snapping down into his neck so fast that if it weren't for the helmet fragments splintering all over the place he might have thought the traitor had retracted his head voluntarily like a tortoise.

Amit was frozen. Had he lost himself to rage? Had his anger stolen his mind and body for an instant, leaving him with no memory of the kill and at the mercy of his volatile temper?

It wasn't until the silver sphere whipped out of the hole in the World Eater's body that the chapter master realised what had killed him.

There was movement from above. He looked up. There- a dark, formless shape crouched upon the rocks. Before Amit could take the measure of it, the figure had leapt from its high vantage point. It was a shadow, concealed by the press of the overhead storm clouds blocking the sun. They rumbled as if in anticipation as this predator descended on the second World Eater. Something which might have been an outstretched hand appeared from the folds of the shadow, gripping a bar from which spewed a thick chain. The chain snapped in response to the shadow's movements, bringing the silver orb, now wreathed in blue flames, swinging down to strike the World Eater. The orb missed his head, but ploughed into his neck, smashing deep into the traitor's body. The World Eater died instantly, collapsing with a 'THUNCK' as the shadow alighted before the stunned Flesh Tearers.

Once the figure was at rest, Amit realised that it was a man. He was covered in a thick cape and cowl of blue grey. His bulk revealed him as an astartes.

"Who are you! ?" Captain Seth demanded, brandishing the Blood Reaver despite the deep wound to his left forearm.

The figure whipped his arm back sharply, causing the Flesh Tearers to ready their weapons, but the mysterious space marine merely snapped the ball portion of his flail back to his hand. As he seized it by the chain at its base, the blue fire on the orb dissolved into nothing. Amit knew what manner of weapon it was.

A force weapon.

The figure casually reached up and tipped back his hood. A grey, leather textured face, framed by shoulder length strings of white hair, looked up at them with blazing yellow eyes.

"I am Temujin the Hun," he spoke with a voice that was cold and flat and deep, like the sound of wind echoing in a cave mouth. "Rune Priest in service to the great company of Wolf Lord Ikuvium Whitewolf of the Space Wolves legion."

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Temujin did not answer any questions about the fate of the other Space Wolves. In fact, he hadn't given them anymore than his identity- he'd just turned away from the three Flesh Tearers and began trekking through the gulley. At Amit's command they pursued him. The rune priest's attitude stirred the hereditary anger within him, but he was familiar with the ways of psykers and respected them, even if their behaviour stretched the limits of the acceptable level of respect that should be afforded to a chapter master. All the same, he fired questions at the Space Wolf as he hurried to keep up with his swift pace.

"What of the rest of your brothers?"

No answer. Amit felt his fingers twitch involuntarily as if his body wanted to lash out at the psyker while his mind resisted. He had a feeling that Temujin wanted to lead them somewhere. Amit continued following, though he wasn't prepared to go much further without explanation.

"What of the World Eaters? Where are they, and what is their strength."

Still no answer.

"You will stand to and answer when a chapter master addresses you, Space Wolf!" Captain Seth barked angrily. "We will not wander blindly into enemy territory because of the secrets you wish to hide. Tell us of the enemy's doings, and of this damned storm that hides them. Answer, _now_!"

The Rune Priest slowed with a sudden lethargic quality, coming to a halt. The Flesh Tearers did likewise.

"The touch of darkness was too great. Even the power of the storms has been wrested from us."

Seth let out a derisive grunt, unimpressed with the almost poetic reply. Amit silenced him with a look. Though the captain might not appreciate the unique ways of the Space Wolves' rune priests, Nassir Amit knew of the strange power they had over the skies of any given world they might set foot on- the ability to create storms to hide their movements from the enemy.

"Tell us of what has taken place here, priest."

Temujin the Hun finally turned to look at Amit. His gaze was fierce… and seemed almost unforgiving. Something cold trickled into the Flesh Tearer's primary heart.

"When they came, they swept over the continent like the coming of the Fenrisian sun," he answered Amit, subdued and resigned. "None were spared. The efforts of the sons of Russ were fruitless. Now they have gathered at the seas edge. I went there myself; saw of the blasphemous arts they worked there. My brothers and the people of this world have been fed to the waves and spat out as monsters. My apprentice too was poisoned by their power. Now they have turned him in upon himself, and his powers are used for the benefit of the traitors, keeping them safe beneath the storm."

"A Space Wolves psyker has thrown in his lot with the enemy! ?" Gorn asked in disgust. Temujin glowered at Sergeant.

"My apprentice has not given in to the darkness. Even now, as the storm rages so his spirit rages against being made use of in this way."

"From what I have seen of this storm, he should try a little harder."

Amit had slammed his balled fist against Seth's chest plate before he'd even finished speaking. The captain instantly reverted to a regretful countenance at the sight of the chapter master so furious. Amit was about to follow up with equally fierce words, but he felt the eyes of the rune priest upon him; saw them in the corner of his vision, looking with disapproval and indignant disgust. The look unnerved Amit. It was as if he was expecting to see even worse behaviour than the angry confrontation before him. Surely he didn't know. He couldn't have heard about the… the gene-curse.

Amit felt his mind wandering. Memories of Signus Prime, and the self-discovery of the Blood Angels. And then of that fateful day- the day Sanguinius fell. They all felt it, as though it was their own deaths, so violent and horrific his fate was. And with the pain of their primarch's death came the new facet of the gene-curse. The rage to match the bloodlust. The loss of identity- of a Blood Angel's very soul- in place of the death throes of Sanguinius.

In the aftermath of the Great Heresy there had been many changes, the creation of the Flesh Tearers among them. But the truth of the gene-curse wasn't widely known- at least, not yet. Surely this Temujin the Hun couldn't know about it. More importantly, he couldn't know about what the gene-curse had cost- what it had cost the Space Wolves.

_Helik Redknife torn apart. The taste of his blood still fresh on his lips._

"Is it justice or irony that should have you come to our aid, Flesh Tearer?"

Amit's full attention snapped back to the rune priest.

"What do you mean, Space Wolf?" Amit replied.

"I read of this path in the runes," Temujin reached out a hand with an old bag made from the shrunken belly of some creature in his grip. He shook it and it rattled with the sound of small stones.

"The great enemy draws close to triumph. They seek to turn our strength against us for their own ends. When the sky clears they will go forth with a champion amidst their number; a champion born of depravity and corruption, to the cost of those who bask in the legacy of Russ. There is one with the power to overturn this fate- the Tearer of Flesh."

Temujin's gaze seemed to intensify. Amit was held by those cruel yellow eyes, even as longed to look away as the rest of the world was closed out till it was only he and the rune priest and the words that were for Amit alone.

"The one who owes a debt of blood to the wolves."

He broke Amit's gaze with ease. The chapter master remained frozen in place even as the Space Wolf turned to look at the path ahead. He knew! How could he know! ?

"There is precious time left to save Wolf Lord Whitewolf," the rune priest stated in an unexpectedly bland tone. "You must follow me," he began to walk away.

"Hold there!" Captain Seth took a step forward. "If there are traitors ahead we cannot just confront them alone. We have an army a matter of minutes a-"

"No!" Temujin barked. "This matter is not to be settled by the masses. Do not send for your warriors. Follow me, now- before it's too late."

The rune priest set off at a light jog.

"Has that psyker lost his mind? He expects us three alone to defeat the entire World Eaters legion?"

"I concur with the captain, my lord," Gorn stepped up next to his chapter master. "This rune priest's suggestions are shear folly, and I wonder whether he can be trusted."

"Aye. We should send for the rest of the squads, and continue with our own plans."

The minds of the captain and the sergeant were made up. Chapter Master Amit, however, was remembering- Signus Prime, and his guilt and his rage. Sanguinius and how he'd nearly fallen to the primarch's wrath because of his brutal honesty- because Amit valued honesty more than anything. Nikaea and his anger when the psykers had been silenced, because he saw in them a touch of the Emperor's majesty.

"I have always trusted the instincts of psykers," Amit addressed his officers. "I will trust them now."

The silence that followed said more than words from Seth or Gorn's lips could have.

"Brothers- we came to this world to aid the Space Wolves in their hour of need. This is the call we have come to answer. Now we go; for the Emperor!"

"For the Emperor!" the officer's replied, still doubtful but ready to fulfil their duty. Together, they set off after Temujin the Hun, towards the inevitable confrontation with the World Eaters.


	4. Chapter 4

The inlet had been the site of building works, with the intention of building a great harbour that would become the bedrock of the planet's economy. Now it was in ruins, torn apart and swept aside with unimaginable force and violence. Only one structure remained, burned and pockmarked with bolt impacts. It was a foreman's platform, lifted high on scaffold legs to allow a wide overview of the local area. Under the gaze of bloodthirsty warlord, the World Eater's worked.

Tarugar looked out over his fiefdom, feeding his anger on the feeble surroundings. The fierce growl of the overhead storm, the close and humid air, the sulphurous rain, the pitiful structures, the bodies of the laughable excuse for the PDF- it all enraged him. Tarugar had been a member of the champion bodyguard of the World Eater's Primarch, Angron. The warrior cabal- the Devourers- had stood side by side with the ever warmongering gladiator lord of the twelfth legion and shared in his rage and insatiable appetite for blood. The altercation that had taken place on Hippocampus didn't even qualify as a skirmish. Though he'd travelled far out of his way to collect the Khornate cult to add to his growing war band, Tarugar had killed many of them out of disgust when the defenders had fallen so pathetically. Even the Space Wolves- though they'd fought hard- were quickly overwhelmed by the size and ferocity of the traitor host. Tarugar would have left the planet days ago, were it not for the sport there was to be had with the sons of Fenris.

The waves lapping at the rocky shore were red, dyed with gallons of blood from the slaughtered populace. The very ocean had changed under the touch of chaos. Even the sound of it was a deeper, hungrier noise, as if it demanded more blood. The sludgy water pulled determinedly at the four World Eaters who stood knee deep in the red sea, holding down a thrashing fifth figure. At a sign from Tarugar atop his throne, the sons of Angron dragged their captive from beneath the surface. Though he had gone under barely alive, the Space Wolf now struggled in a deranged frenzy. The dusty blue of his armour was all but consumed by varying shades of red and pink; the colours of blood and skin. True to the name of the mutant cult that had begun here, the corrupted ocean had re-forged the warrior until the armour itself had become flesh- another layer of the space marine's body, with blood weeping from the joints. The astartes was lost to madness as a rabid beast now, head folding back as he opened his jaws impossibly wide to let out a demented howl. Deeming him of some vague worth, the World Eaters began to drag the monster towards the waiting dropships, to be made ready for transportation to the strike cruisers where he would join the ranks of Tarugar's war host.

Tarugar had found the mutating touch of the warp from the damned ocean mildly amusing when the Hippocampus rough riders had first been changed. However, it hadn't taken long for his patience to run thin, and the uninteresting result of the Space Wolf's transformation made him seethe.

"Another freak to herd into my war band. Do I look the idle sort to you, vagabond? Or do you think I have no greater pursuits to give my time for other than watching you play with your experiments?"

The one Tarugar addressed stood from where he'd been working with the salvaged remains of a pair of chain weapons. He was clad in power armour that was completely unadorned other than the colours and multi headed snake emblem of the Alpha Legion.

"Our work here is nearly complete," brother Zol's oily voice hummed from the vox emitters of his plain helmet. "I assure you, your time here is well spent, and you will see results soon enough."

Zol's undecorated war gear was a vast contrast to the Devourer's. Tarugar's hulking, broad shouldered form was nearly twice Zol's mass. Spikes poked from his knuckles and lightening claw sheaths gripped his wrists. A length of human skin was stretched over his chest like some macabre banner. In the centre of this hideous trophy was the twisted, misshapen face of an Imperial Fists captain who had fallen to Tarugar in the siege of Terra. A fan of spikes rose up from his back, with the heads and helms of space marines, both loyalist and traitor, and one human skull of a particularly capable Cadian commander impaled on them. The Devourer's face was a scrunched, angry thing that glowered at the Alpha legionnaire. In his terminator armour, he towered over Zol, and while the death of Zol could mean trouble with the astartes and humans he'd led to join Tarugar, the Devourer was close to disregarding the risk as the desire to kill took hold.

"Time spent with such witchcraft taking place is an insult to the bloodfather. Do you take me for a sorcerer now, or did you get lost looking to offer your services to Magnus instead?"

"You will soon have your champion of Khorne, as I promised you. All I am doing is channelling the touch of the warp. This craft is simply a means to an end."

Tarugar bit down on his anger. As much as he desired to kill, he also desired power, and Zol had promised him power in return for a high position in the war band. Tarugar looked out to sea, where Zol had worked his foul arts for the cause of the blood god.

At a distance that brought the waters up to an average man's neck, the bowed head and shoulders of a space marine could be seen. It was the wolf lord known as Ikuvium Whitewolf. His face was hidden beneath his cracked helm, but his stance suggested he was unconscious- possibly dead. Above him, a black robed tech-priest of the Dark Mechanicum with a red, insect scatter of mechanical eyes hovered on built in grav-motors as it directed the servitors holding the Space Wolf in place. One of the daemon corrupted drones was unexpectedly dragged under by something. It did not resurface. Unperturbed, the tech-priest let out a burst of burbling machine noise that carried to the shore. Another servitor lurched from a captured cargo hauler and staggered out into the tainted water.

Tarugar's impatience was marginally alleviated as he watched. Zol had told him about the nature of the Space Wolves- about their _flaw_. The claim had already been proved with the effective corruption of the psyker whelp, whose crucified body now powered the storm that would defend them from aerial attacks until their work was done. The process to exploit the chink in the Space Wolves' armour of will involved the use of corruptive magicks. Such things risked invoking the ire of Khorne who hated all magicks, but Zol was not of the World Eater's chapter, and he had assured the Devourer that the practice was only necessary to create their creature. And from what he'd heard of the sort of creature it would be, Tarugar was glad to take the risk.

Whitewolf jerked suddenly, and the tech-priest's mechadendrites struck out, pushing spikes into exposed ports where the space marine's power armour interfaced with his body, or manipulating plugs and implants forced into the astartes' flesh in order to regulate the process.

"It has begun," Tarugar grinned savagely as the makeshift incubator the power armour had become shuddered as if the body inside was fighting to break out.

"So it has," Zol said evenly as he went back to cannibalising the two chainswords taken from the defeated wolf lord. "Soon the means will have served its end, and you shall have your champion. Soon…"

X-X X-X X-X X-X X-X X-X X-X X-X X-X X-X X-X X-X X-X X-X X-X X-X X-X X-X X-X X-X X-X

The four space marine's ran through the avenues of stone, with Temujin the Hun setting the pace. Amit found himself running alone with the rune priest. His officers were trailing behind. They hadn't said a word to him or to each other, but the silence spoke volumes. They disagreed with his decision. Anger burned hot within him. The rage threatened to take hold, but he tempered it with shame. His warriors followed him loyally, and yet their misgivings weren't without merit. They had no idea what the rune priest was leading them into. All they knew was that they were going in alone to where the highest concentration of the enemy was. Amit prided his courage in facing the enemy head on. But he was rushing to battle whist leaving his warriors behind, unguided and uninformed. This was not behaviour befitting a chapter master.

"It is right that you should be so troubled with such a heavy conscience, Flesh Tearer. Yet, it does not do for your mind to wander if you are so concerned about the enemy."

For a moment Amit didn't realise it was a living voice rather than one in his head. He started, though the rune priest at his side didn't acknowledge his reaction. The Flesh Tearer's anger spiked.

"If you have peered into my mind psyker, I shall kill you where you stand, enemy or not."

"Since the Great Betrayal," Temujin blatantly ignored Amit's threat "we both know that the enemy we should be most concerned with is the enemy within."

Amit's temper cooled to simmering point. He knew of the double meaning implied in Temujin's words.

The gene-curse.

"What do you know of Signus Prime?"

Amit was galled by his weakness; the need to address that painful issue so openly. But despite himself, he couldn't bear to continue in such uncertainty. He had to find out just how much the rune priest knew.

"I was on Fenris when the heresy began. I had a vision- a vision of violence more ferocious and untameable than I have witnessed in a hundred years of war. I saw angels fall to become bestial things of death and slaughter, and a bloody knife broken beneath one- the one who called itself the Flesh Tearer. It was then that I knew my friend, Helik Redknife, had been slain."

Amit looked at the rune priest to find cold, accusing eyes meeting his.

"What right have you to judge?" Amit growled. "You were not there. The Space Wolves weren't there at Terra. Not when the traitors fired on Luna; not when the World Eaters stormed the walls. You do not know what happened."

"I know of the flaw," Temujin spoke sharply, forcing Amit to fall silent. "I know of the wound that was ripped wide with the death of Sanguinius. Your Blood Angel brothers have not spoken openly of it, but I have heard of your death companies made up of maddened brothers. I sense the flaw even now, within you, and your fellows. The rage burns, as much a part of your as your guilt laden hearts."

Amit felt sick inside. It was as if he could feel the gene-curse itself festering in his gut, and Temujin's diagnosis made it impossible to ignore. Some sons of Sanguinius welcomed the touch of the madness as the blessed touch of the primarch himself. But all Amit could liken it too was the bloody mark of shame left on the surface of Signus Prime; damning evidence he could never wash away.

"Tell me what became of my friend." Temujin's request came in a slightly softer tone- not inviting or understanding. Just blunted, like the weariness of a man who had fought one too many wars in his lifetime.

"Our Lord Sanguinius was struck down by a daemon that had ambushed us on Signus Prime. Up to that point we and the Space Wolves had fought side by side as we tried to understand the truth of the heresy taking place. But when our Lord fell, something erupted within us. All was wrath. We tore into our enemies with abandon, ripping them apart with our bare hands when bolters ran dry and blades snapped in our grips. I can recall little of the battle; just snatches through a red haze. But when the haze finally lifted…" a tightness in Amit's throat made him pause. It was the weight of guilt.

"… your wolf lord was dead by my hand, his blood on my lips after I'd tried to quench the Thirst."

Temujin the Hun slowed to a halt, giving the chapter master a hard stare. Seth and Gorn stopped a stone's throw behind, instinctively aware that they were not wanted in the conversation but obviously curious.

"And you concealed this crime for all these years?" he said in a low tone that even the lyman's ears of the Flesh Tearer officers couldn't hear.

"I was sworn to secrecy by my brothers," Amit protested. "With the traitors moving against Terra, we who remained loyal needed to be united."

Temujin sniffed mockingly. Amit fumed.

"I have not forgotten what took place. I have lived with this shame ever since. I came to this world to save the Space Wolves as an act of atonement. I regret what I did, but I will answer for it to myself. Do not presume that I will answer to you."

The rune priest frowned wordlessly at the chapter master, who answered the expression with a scowl. He may have done wrong, but the crime was his burden to bear, and he wouldn't have the psyker judge him.

"You are right, Flesh Tearer."

Amit's temper calmed completely with supreme satisfaction as the rune priest gave in. He was about to order them to advance again, but Temujin wasn't done.

"You cannot earn atonement from the wolf sons; it is not our place to absolve you of your crime."

Amit paused uncertainly, before his temper flared again and he said "What are you saying? That only the Emperor himself can absolve me! ?"

"It is up to you and you alone. A life for a life is the only way."

"You would have me die for this! ?"

Temujin's eyes narrowed, revealing neither affirmation nor denial. After a long pause he said "You cannot atone unless you confront the darkness within you. You must embrace this shame, in heart and in blood. You know this to be the only path open to you."

Amit scowled.

"If all you have to give me are riddles then I do not wish to hear," he turned back to the path ahead. "Enough time has been wasted. Let's move."

Temujin caught his arm.

"Not yet."

"Why not?"

"This is the best place to confront them," Temujin gestured ahead. The canyon like structure had ended before a field of sable stalagmites. The way ahead was slick from the odorous rain and crowded with shadows. Through the forest of stone it was just possible to make out the streak of ocean against the sky.

"To confront who?" Amit demanded.

"Haegi, Tyr and Beorc Eoh."

There was a sound of crumbling stones. Captain Seth and Sergeant Gorn looked sharply upward to the edge of the canyon wall.

A monster loomed above them, hideously illuminated by a shard of lighting.

"Wolf Lord Whitewolf's pack,"


	5. Chapter 5

What had once been a noble Fenrisian wolf was now a profane horror; one of the Flesh Forged. Tusks curled up from the pulp where its face had once been. Only the mouth remained, yawning open even as a snaking, slimy tongue with a swollen eyeball on the tip was disgorged. The thing reared up on its back legs, exposing the barrel of a plasma weapon imbedded in its chest just before it exploded and sent a miniature supernova flying toward Seth and Gorn.

A blinding burst of light followed the blast, followed by a roar of pain from one of the Flesh Tearers.

"NO!"

Amit lunged in the direction of his officers but Temujin stopped him.

"Haegi is for your men to kill. You must be ready to confront Beorc Eoh."

A swooping sound stalled any argument. From the stalagmite field something was swinging towards them through the stone boughs. It was another wolf, with no legs but elongated arms allowing it to move fast like some ape creature. It hurled itself from the spiked tip of one stalagmite and soured at Temujin, mouths opening in its head and stomach. With a gesture, the rune priest knocked the freak out of the air, sending it flying sideways.

"Hold your ground, Flesh Tearer," Temujin drew his flail and sent a ripple of fire down the chain. "Tyr is my foe. Prepare to slay yours," he stalked off after the monster.

Amit paused in indecision while the familiar roar of the Blood Reaver joined the gargled howl of the former wolf Haegi. He wanted to assist his fellows, but was wary of the rune priests warning. He remembered now- Lord Whitewolf had been famous for having tamed four of these wolves. It seemed they had shared the fate of the people of Hippocampus, and apparently a third one was nearby.

It was perhaps a second before the Flesh Tearer's patience ran out, but that was all the time needed for a new enemy to stalk out from the shadows.

Nassir Amit couldn't help but feel disgusted by the sight. It was the third wolf in the wolf lord's pack… _and_ the fourth.

The wolves Beorc and Eoh had been blended into one creature by the traitor's foul works.

The thing known as Beorc Eoh was a head taller than Amit in his terminator armour. It scuttled forward with an insect crawl on back legs that were thick and distended, bending in odd places with no sign of proper joint bones. Two legs reached out like arms ready for a lethal embrace, long and gangling with claws as long as Amit's face. Two compact, club like arms erupted from its abdomen. But the head- the correct term was now _heads_. Two wolf faces snapped and growled alongside each other, white eyed and insane, straining against their own necks to reach for Amit. The Flesh Tearer steered at the beast.

"By the Blood, back to the hells that spawned you!"

Chapter Master Amit dived forward, stabbing one tonfa at the wolf fiend's belly, another at its heads. The clubbed arms of the beast scratched the first weapon away. The blow aimed at the heads pierced one wolf in the neck. It roared, but the second head was unfazed and bit down on Amit's hand. The gauntlet buckled between the teeth, and Amit fumbled and dropped the chaintonfa as he pulled his hand free. As he stepped back the monster's larger arms slashed the air towards him. There was a shriek as several claw marks were swiftly ripped in his chest plate, and Amit grunted in pain as a talon from the other paw punctured the gash left by the World Eater chainaxe and skewered his shoulder.

The chapter master used his now empty hand to rip the claw out, but as he tried to crush the paw the monster jerked forward and the arms bursting from its chest scrabbled at him. Smaller claws scored his face and nicked the corner of his left eyeball. Amit let out a growl of both pain and anger, but had no choice but to back off as the first set of claws swept back in for a decapitating blow.

As Amit tried to put some distance between him and the monster it followed, faster than he could lumber backwards in his tactical dreadnaught armour. Blood streamed from the corner of the Flesh Tearer's eye like tears of blood, trickling down to his mouth. The space marine welcomed the taste, the tang of genetic perfection not dampening the raw flavour of his life fluid or the rush it gave him. He fed his rage on the insult that this corruption before him had dealt such a wound. He forced himself onto his front foot and ploughed into the mutated folds of Beorc Eoh, slashing wildly with his tonfa in search of a vengeful blow.

Amit's chaintonfa churned against the monster's body, but its fur was dense and had the constitution of wire wool- the teeth of the chain weapon clogged before they could break skin. Amit faltered, and the beast attacked, both heads biting down on either side of neck. Amit cried out furiously, muffled by a face full of steely fur. He punched the creature in the gut multiple times, breaking the arms poking out of the lower body with his power gauntlet. The wolf wretch pulled back with mouthfuls of flesh and armour. Amit shouldered the creature away and quickly picked up his fallen tonfa. Fully armed again he straightened up, only to be knocked flat by a massive blow. The mutant's claws punched through the terminator armour and left deep wounds in the chapter master's body.

Amit landed on his back, stunned by the strength of the beast. The claws had not found any vital organs, but they hurt. The physical pain throbbed with each beat of his hearts, but he ignored that. It was the psychological pain- the shame, the humiliation of failure, that drove Amit back to his feet. His blood surged with fury. This monster had made enough mockery of him. He would end its pitiful life now and savour the kill as though it were all he wanted from his existence. He spluttered a curse through teeth clenched so tight blood leaked from his gums and flew at the beast, chaintonfas cutting the air.

With brute strength Amit forced the saw toothed weapons through Beorc Eoh's fur and cut two long gashes in its body. The accursed creature bayed and a head snapped forward. One swipe knocked the hateful face away. Another rammed a tonfa into the base of the attacking head's throat. The wolf let out an animalistic scream and Amit laughed as his chain blade pulped the monster's flesh and sprayed blood over his face. The head fell as a dead weight, but the second head pushed forward with even more vigour to bite into Amit's skull. The Flesh Tearer dropped his free weapon and caught the head by its ear before it could strike. The press of the monsters body prevented him from extracting his other blade.

The Flesh Tearer and Beorc Eoh were held in a moment of stalemate. The corrupted wolf struggled in the space marine's grip, its ear ripping ominously as it inched closer. The desire to live, but more than that, the desire to win- to kill- spurred Amit on till he was straining against the beast with a feral rage that matched his enemy's. They snarled at each other, mirror images close enough to see the saliva glistening on each other's fangs and smell each other's rasping breath. Amit snarled, then thrust his head forward to head butt the twisted creature. The mutant reeled- its head tipped back in the grip of the astartes, exposing its throat, and Amit just couldn't resist such a tantalising invitation.

He reached forward with his mouth. His teeth gnashed and the freaks howl became a bubbling hiss as Nassir Amit drank deep.

In that moment there was complete calm. Like a squalling babe answered by its mother, Amit's rage mellowed as he suckled from the custom made teat. Pain and fatigue, the surge of adrenaline, awareness of the stone underfoot and the storm overhead- everything vanished in a cloud of red, and Amit found himself floating.

Floating in an ocean of blood.

It was but a single moment, but the moment seemed to stretch for infinity. When Amit came round he found himself on his knees leaning over the body of Beorc Eoh.

The monstrously combined wolves had been torn asunder.

Amit looked around to see flecks of meat floating in a blood slick spread nearly two metres in diameter from where he knelt. A web of ripped organs and sinew trailed from the massive crater in the monsters body. Limbs were twisted and broken or had been snapped off altogether. Amit saw the wolf face that had been second to die was frozen in a tortured cry of agony while its innards steamed in the open air. He looked down to his hands. They were drenched in blood, the fingers of his power gauntlets cracked and the cracks clogged with fleshy paste and tufts of fur. He could taste defiled blood on his tongue and in the back of his throat.

Nassir Amit recoiled in horror.

"Holy Throne, what have I done?"

The events from centuries ago swarmed into his mind as though it were yesterday. The day of his great shame- and he had repeated his crime! He had gone too far; allowed himself to drink what should never be drunk.

He'd just feasted on the blood of the mutant, and a part of him longed to drink further.

Amit shook himself, trying to concentrate on what was going around him rather than on his thoughts. He was ashamed, and appalled, but he couldn't give into weakness now. Not when strength was needed more than ever. Even with the diabolical thirst partially quenched, the ache in his mind was stinging fervently, agitated by his bloodthirsty display. The Red Thirst- the insane craving for blood that had always been the legacy of Sanguinius' gene-seed- and the Black Rage- the bestial fury left by the psychic aftershock of the primarch's death; the twin burdens scratched at the walls of their prison in Amit's brain, as though a hot wire had been forced in through his eye socket.

Amit pushed back against the impulsions, but they were too enflamed. The ache had tasted blood again, and it demanded more.

"My lord," the chapter master jumped as Captain Seth approached. The ache was so strong it robbed him of awareness; he should have sensed the captain easily.

The craving for blood strained at the leash at the sight of the captain. The throbbing pulse in Seth's neck leapt out at Amit, as did the rents in his armour from which red fluid could be seen. He could practically sense the flow of blood through the space marine's body. Amit composed himself by force of will.

"Captain, you are wounded."

"Minor injuries, my lord- of no concern," Seth waved the chapter master's concerns away, but his wounds were clearly worse than he let on.

"Where is Sergeant Gorn?" Amit asked, but he quickly noticed the figure lying prone next to the brutalised remains of the wolf Haegi. Gorn was stirring but bleeding heavily.

"That plasma blast struck too close," Seth explained. "The sergeant fought hard, but without an apothecary he will likely perish."

"Call for reinforcements. Have the squads advance immediately to our position. This game has gone on long enough."

Amit turned in the direction of the rune priest as Seth followed the orders. He had followed Temujin without question and it had nearly cost the life of one of his finest astartes. He would not claim redemption at such a cost. The crime was his to answer for. The cause was the gene-curse he had to bare. No one would seek a cost or pay a price on his behalf. He would now complete the mission on Hippocampus his own way, and not have the psyker lead him like a beast for the hunt, regardless of what he knew of the murder of Helik Redknife.

He would find redemption, _his_ way.

Temujin had also slain his foe. He was crouched by the ruined corpse with his hands over his face as though mourning. Amit called to him, but it was still a moment or two before he left the body, clearly only returning to chapter master's side because he was ready rather than because of the summons.

"There was nothing that could be done for these once noble creatures," Temujin said absently, possibly to himself rather than to the Flesh Tearers. "Death over dishonour. It is the way of all those truly loyal to the Allfather," he looked pointedly at Amit whose reply was nothing more than a stony gaze.

"There is no signal, my lord," Seth reported. "The storm interferes with the vox."

"If we do not hurry our brother will be lost needlessly. Can you make it back to our lines with those wounds?"

"What are you doing?"

Amit looked round at Temujin.

"This chase of yours has gone far enough. We will stay here and defend the sergeant while my captain carries world to the rest of our squads to join us. After that we will proceed with the strategy for defeating the traitors and cleansing this world."

"No!" Temujin took an aggressive step towards Amit. "Wolf Lord Whitewolf remains in the clutches of the enemy. The time to save him from their corruption grows short. We must press on."

"You wish me to leave a brother in arms to die for your cause?" the Flesh Tearer rounded on Temujin, letting his temper rise in spite of his recent loss of control to his anger.

"You owe a debt of blood to the wolf sons. You cannot refuse to repay this debt to spare the blood of your own legion."

"I owe nothing to you, psyker! I fulfil my debts on my own terms. The Space Wolves do not command me."

He turned away. Temujin the Hun lunged forward to grab his arm, but the moment he did the chapter master swung round and struck him with enough force to throw him to the ground.

"You dare lay your hands on me! ?"

"You must not delay, Flesh Tearer! The fate of the sons of Russ depends upon you!" the rune priest's tone took on a note of desperation. "The enemy seek to taint the honour of the Space Wolves. Their new champion will bring about this shame. You must prevent it!"

"I have my own honour to concern myself with, as well as my own purpose, and that purpose is not decided by you. If you are convinced that so few can snatch your wolf lord from the hands of the traitors then save him yourself."

"That option is not open to me; I will not survive the final battle."

Amit paused as he began to turn away.

"What do you mean psyker?"

"I foresaw it when I first set foot on this doomed planet," the Space Wolf explained in an empty, resigned voice. "I will confront the traitors one last time, but my fate is already set. I will never leave this world," he looked Amit dead in the eye.

"I will fight for my lord, but I will not be there to see this through to the end. I searched for one who could triumph in my stead, and I found you, Flesh Tearer. You must succeed where I will inevitably fail, or the Space Wolves have lost all hope."

Amit looked hard at the Rune Priest Temujin the Hun. The psyker's face was blank and his eyes were as cruel as ever, but Amit could find no falsehood in the Space Wolf's words.

There was a long silence as the two astartes measured each other.

"My lord- Sergeant Gorn's vitals are deteriorating by the second. I do not believe he will last long enough for me to bring an apothecary to him."

It was another moment before Amit answered Seth. He took the time to observe the sergeant's wounds; deep gashes in his chest, with the left side of his body scotched by the plasma blast, his combat shield and scale cloak fused with his body.

"Can you carry him?"

Seth blinked with surprise.

"I can, but-"

"Take him back to the rest of the Flesh Tearers immediately," Amit commanded. "As soon as you are there, take charge and proceed with my original strategy. Your targets are the garrisons overrun by the enemy."

"But what of you, my lord?"

"I will go with the rune priest and seek out Ikuvium Whitewolf."

"No, my lord! You cannot go alone," Seth drew himself up. "You must allow me to accompany you."

"I will decide what I must do, captain," Amit replied fiercely.

"You cannot ask me to abandon you as you go to confront the enemy."

"I have given you your order, captain. You are wounded, and our brother lies at the point of death. I will not waste lives on a task solely appointed to me."

"This is folly!" Seth raged suddenly, pointing an accusing finger at Temujin.

"This psyker speaks madness! Who is he to dictate commands to the Flesh Tearer? Lord, his will is decided by whims and uncertain visions. You cannot allow him to decide your actions."

"He does not, Seth. No one decides my actions," Amit said firmly, forcefully overcoming his own rising anger to speak with the weight of authority. "Too long I have been at the mercy of the gene-curse. I have had to wrest control of my actions from my rage for as long as I can remember."

Seth fell silent, taken aback by such frank acknowledgment of the gene-curse in front of someone from outside the chapter.

"Now we are here, and I discover that a loyal astartes of the Emperor's cause is in peril, and his allies are powerless to help him. This decision is my own. I do not go forth because of the rage, or the cost of it," he shot a look at the rune priest who was just picking himself up.

"I go for honours sake, because I decide where my honour lies. And I have decided that it lies with safeguarding my brothers as they wage war in His name. I will not leave Wolf Lord Whitewolf to his fate, nor will I allow Sergeant Gorn to die on my behalf, or for our strategy to be delayed."

Amit stepped towards Seth and laid a hand on his shoulder.

"Brother, you must do this for me."

Captain Seth was stunned. He'd never heard his chapter master speak with such sincerity. Since his indoctrination all he'd believed of the Flesh Tearers was that it was their purpose to kill, nothing more. In that instant, he understood the true burden that came with being a chapter master- of being a Flesh Tearer.

At length, Seth reluctantly said "I shall do as you command, but as soon as we advance we shall seek you out and assist in your task."

Amit allowed the defiant proviso. Were it not for such gall, Seth would never have made the rank of first captain.

"By the Blood, His will be done," the chapter master said.

"By the Blood," Seth bowed his head, before turning and gathering up Gorn's body, hoisting him over his shoulder, and setting off as fast as he could back down the path they'd taken.

Amit turned to Temujin.

"Lead on, psyker."


	6. Chapter 6

A long, bumpy stretch of pebbles and rocks was the final path before the ocean met the land.

The waters were red with blood.

With the storm overhead the sea groaned unwelcomingly, waves crashing over each other in abandon. Piles of wreckage funnelled the approach towards the shoreline leaving the way ahead clear.

Amit scowled in disgust at the sight of the World Eaters, three score in number, scattered over the field. Some were in small clusters watching as duels took place. Rough cheers carried on the wind every time blood was shed. Others were making half-hearted efforts to inspect their war gear or loitered aimlessly as though the lack of any battle to fight rendered them somnambulistic.

At the edge of the unmarked perimeter where the traitors had made camp, a post had been erected with the body of a space marine crucified on an X shaped cross. Some piece of piping had been inscribed with glowing runes of dark intent and rammed through the side of the astartes till it had burst out on the opposite side of his body. The head was missing, and pieces of spinal cord had been pulled out through the neck and also out through his nether region to hang obscenely as the last of eight points coming out of his body. Though the figure in the armour of the Space Wolves was clearly dead, his body was jerking and twitching, and a strange haze like evaporating water was lifting from his body.

"My apprentice," Temujin explained blandly. "Still they mar his memory to use our gifts of the Allfather against us."

"If I can get you to your brother, can you stop this storm?"

"All I need do is destroy that foul offering and the skies will clear in time."

Amit cast his gaze over the path ahead. There were two traitor marines guarding the body, but they seemed more interested in catching drops of blood falling from the corpse to sup at rather than keep watch. So far, he and Temujin hadn't been spotted despite the lack of cover. It wouldn't take the enemy long to see them once they approached, but they could reach the violated body in a matter of seconds if they ran.

"What about your wolf lord?"

"He is over yonder," Temujin pointed to the sea. "I only hope they have not finished using their sorcery against him."

"Tell me, priest," Amit looked curiously at his companion. "What is this champion you speak of? How is it that such a being will come from the capture of a loyal astartes?"

All of a sudden, Temujin looked uncertain.

"There are… aspects to the heritage of Leman Russ beyond even his son's comprehension."

Amit detected a hint of deceit.

"Explain yourself, priest."

Temujin paused and considered the question carefully. Amit's eyes narrowed.

"With the dark forces at the enemy's disposal, an astartes could be corrupted into a monster and set upon prey mindlessly."

"But they could create such a creature the same way these vile Flesh Forged cultists have been. What is so particular about a Space Wolf being changed in such a way?" Amit turned to look down on the rune priest, far shorter in his standard dusty blue armour next to the terminator.

"What are you not telling me?"

"There are limitations…flaws in the gene-seed of the Space Wolves. Such flaws could be used and manipulated as part of the enemy's efforts to corrupt a loyal brother, just as my apprentice has been."

"And what is the nature of these fla-"

"That is not your business!" Temujin turned angry without warning. "The nature of the Space Wolves is our own concern, as is your bloodthirsty madness yours!"

Amit smouldered. He opened his mouth to demand an explanation but a sudden cry of alarm stalled him. Over by the crucified Space Wolf, one of the sentinels had spotted them.

Amit glanced back at the rune priest.

"This matter is not done with yet, psyker. But as of now, there is blood to be shed."

The chaintonfas reeved into life.

At an unvoiced signal, both space marines broke into a thundering charge. Stone was turned to splinters under their feet as they rushed the cross where the slain rune priest hung. The World Eater guards levelled oil slicked bolters in their direction and opened fire.

The Space Wolf and the Flesh Tearer ran into the wave of fire. Temujin the Hun weaved a deranged path as he rushed to meet the enemy, dodging rounds and occasional deflecting barrages with flashes of telekinetic energy. Amit's path was as straight as an arrow, relying on his terminator armour to defend him as barrelled forward like a runaway dozer. Bolts flicked off of his insurmountable armour but never even came close to his exposed face, even as he zeroed in on the nearest traitor marine.

The nameless legionary dropped his bolter at the last moment and lunged for Amit, drawing a jagged sabre from his back to hack down with. The teeth of the chapter master's left tonfa shattered the blade easily. The right tonfa plunged into the warrior's stomach before erupting out through his hip.

Even almost severed in two, the World Eater didn't give up. He threw himself onto Amit before his legs could collapse from under him, wrapping one hand round his throat whist he tried to bludgeon the Flesh Tearer with his free fist. Amit swiftly lifted a tonfa high and stabbed down tip first through the World Eater's neck. He jerked it around to be sure to catch several organs with the grinding teeth before ripping the weapon free.

The Flesh Tearer discarded the fresh corpse and looked to his companion, who was just finishing off his own adversary. As the rune priest stepped past the mangled body he brought back the hand that gripped his flail and paused for a moment-

"Too long has your passage been delayed, brother. Go now, to glory."

-and then the flail was singing through the air until it impacted upon the body of the crucified Space Wolf. The flaming orb hit the dead centre of the chest and the body blew apart, the cross breaking under the force of the blow. With the destruction of the sacrificial offering, the storms above protested and growled their disapproval. Even as they watched, the clouds became marginally lighter and the foul smelling rain finally stopped.

"It will be a few hours, but the skies will clear, and you shall have your air support."

Amit paid the priest's words no mind. There would no air support to aid them now. Up ahead, he could see the World Eaters had been stirred in their nest, the warning fire bringing them running and baying for blood.

"In spirit, a loyal astartes is worth more than a thousand traitors," Temujin mused "but in this case I fear that the numbers in the flesh may make the difference."

Amit smiled grimly at the small army approaching.

"I was saving this for something special."

The Space Wolf looked to see what Amit was referring to and saw an ammunition clip resting in the Flesh Tearer's hand. Amit gave him a sadistic smile.

"Ready to save your wolf lord, psyker?"

"I have been ready for this day since I set foot on the accursed world," Temujin the Hun said solemnly. The rune priest threw his hand out to the side and his flail ignited with blue flames once again. Amit nodded appreciatively before slamming the clip into his one remaining wrist mounted storm bolter.

"For the Blood, and the Emperor!"

"For Russ, and the Allfather!"

X-X X-X X-X X-X X-X X-X X-X X-X X-X X-X X-X X-X X-X X-X X-X X-X X-X X-X X-X X-X X-X

Tarugar spun round as he realised the scale of the commotion spilling into his domain. Stragglers of the Space Wolves and the PDF had wandered close enough to spark a few exchanges of bolt fire and swordplay, but this attack hadn't been put down in a matter of seconds- it was driving into his captured territory. Disgust, outrage and eager anticipation raced through the Devourer as he sought out the heart of the battle.

There! Two figures- one in the colours of the Space Wolves, the ball and chain of his force weapon swatting his warriors aside, setting them aflame, whilst strings of lightening shot from his free hand to roast World Eaters alive. And the other, a terminator like himself, blowing open space marines with controlled bursts of bolt fire or cutting the apart with a pair of chain weapons.

He knew this warrior. Not in meeting, but by reputation. He'd seen him fight in the training pits of the World Eaters as an honoured guest. He'd once been admired by the twelfth legion as a worthy and respected cousin. He'd even been granted an honorary title by the captains of the broken legion.

"So, the Flesh Tearer has sought me out," Tarugar laughed as he watched his warriors fight and die in a futile attempt to block the Flesh Tearer's advance.

"You know this son of Sanguinius," it was a statement, not a question that came from brother Zol. Tarugar nodded.

Of all the blinded fools that refused to draw back from the oppression of the false-Emperor's shadow, the Blood Angels were ones to be mocked and despised for their hypocrisy. During the so called Bringing of Illumination, the World Eaters had acknowledged a grudging respect for the ninth legion's fierce close combat ability. The legions had been of similar minds when it came to battle, relishing in combat for its own sake rather than the supposedly higher purpose it served. Yet while the World Eaters were honest and direct in their love of war, the Blood Angels had lied to others and themselves. They took their pleasure in battle, and then denied it, claiming their devotion to the Emperor to be their only desire, even going so far as to look down on the World Eaters for their savage disposition. They even jested that the World Eaters would have done better keeping their first name, the War Hounds.

Dogs of the Emperor, they called them.

Such insult could not be allowed to pass, and Tarugar activated his lightning claws as his rage began to flare under his skin.

The Flesh Tearer would die.

The Devourer braced his foot on the platforms handrail, ready to leap into the approaching fray.

Then a hand stopped him, pulling him back by the shoulder.

"No, Master!"

Tarugar rounded on Zol.

"Filth! You hold me back from the bloodletting! ?" Tarugar advanced on his minion, anger mounting as he burned to strike him down. He would not hold back this time.

"This is not meant to be. Do not confront the enemy yourself," Zol gestured down to the ocean, to where the gaggle of servitors and the Dark Mechanicum tech priest struggled with an armoured figure.

"This is what you have laboured for; to claim your champion of Khorne. Now the moment has come- let the beast fight the Flesh Tearer."

Tarugar's anger receded instantly. It didn't leave- it never did- but it burned undirected, no longer commanding his actions.

The warlord smiled cruelly.

"Yes. Better by far," he gloated. "Have them release it, now," Tarugar turned away and watched as the loyalists drew close to his tower. Deactivating his lightning claws, he drew in a deep breath and bellowed.


	7. Chapter 7

"FLESH TEARER!"

Amit froze halfway through bisecting a traitor as he heard his name ring through the air. The words held enough authority that the surrounding astartes backed off rather than interrupt with their bloodlust. Amit sought out the source of the voice, and his eyes found the foreman's tower. Atop the platform, shadowed against the thick sky, the black armoured figure of a terminator looked down on him.

"See me, Flesh Tearer, for I am the engineer of your doom. This is my world. Its people are now my slaves. You fight a hopeless cause and you will never leave this place."

Amit recoiled in surprise. He recognised the World Eater who addressed him. He had long since purged from his mind the feelings of friendship for the oath brothers who'd turned their backs on him in the heresy, like Khârn and Ahriman, but he had yet to meet any of the traitors whom he knew from the years they'd fought together in the Emperor's name. This space marine he didn't know personally, but he remembered seeing him briefly, in the shadow of Angron himself.

Tarugar.

He had been part of the warrior cult 'The Devourers'- bodyguard to the World Eater's primarch and terminator equipped legion heroes. Tarugar, as he recalled, had been a champion of lesser standing, recognised merely for his kill tally rather than acts of bravery or skill. However, by the time of the siege of Terra, Tarugar had been holding a far more prominent position following the deaths of many more revered brothers, rumoured to have been killed hunting down a loyalist World Eater. Now he was here, challenging Amit, and by extension the Emperor himself, shamelessly.

"Is that so?" Amit sneered. "Then see me, _Devourer_! I am the instrument of the Emperor's vengeance, and I have no intention of leaving. Not until every last World Eater scum lies dead by my hand."

Tarugar boomed with laughter.

"You're as deluded as I remember. Praising a corpse and taking orders from mortal men- how low my cousins have fallen."

"I am cousin to no traitor! The World Eaters will never be recognised as sons of the Emperor again. You will die for your crimes, but before you do you will give up Wolf Lord Whitewolf, or so help me I will see you taken back to my ship to have every implant extracted from your body by force before you die, starting with those warp dammed butcher's nails!"

Tarugar growled at the slight.

"Very well. You may have your wolf lord, and be welcome to him."

Tarugar turned in place and looked out to sea. Amit followed his gaze and saw a cluster of figures, one hovering above the rest on grav-motors, the others struggling together in the neck deep waters. Suddenly one of them thrashed, and next thing a body erupted from the waves, propelled by incredible force. It arced in the sky and slammed down some metres ahead of Amit. It was a servitor, but a servitor corrupted by warp energies with angry skin a tentacles coming out of its face. But the thing that caught the Flesh Tearer's eyes were its wounds.

Savage rips and gouges, too compact and messy to be made with the edge of a weapon, almost as if someone had torn out great clumps of flesh with their bare hands.

"We are too late."

Temujin's haunted words were almost lost beneath the garbled wail of a vox emitter overloaded by a terrible roar as a figure in power armour in the middle of the pack smashed aside the servitors around him and splashed towards the shore. The tech-priest swept out of the figure's way. The World Eaters scattered in all directions, leaving a clear path between the two loyalists and the being wading towards them. Amit realised the figure was a Space Wolf, his armour covered in runes and totems that marked his authority.

They had found Ikuvium Whitewolf, but something was wrong. He moved awkwardly, his armour shifting disjointedly as through it hadn't been fitted properly or was the wrong size. He spotted intense battle damage in the armour that looked near fatal, yet the wolf lord was not slowed by the injuries.

"The champion has been birthed," Temujin breathed. "This is the murderer of the Space Wolves' honour. You must stop this thing, Flesh Tearer."

"What is it?"

"It is the legacy of the Russ, twisted perversely to suit the enemy's purpose."

"Speak plainly, damn you! What is this thing we face! ?"

Temujin's expression suggested near physical pain as he faltered in his reply.

"It is… the flaw of the Space Wolves' gene-seed. It is the power of our chapter that can at any time overwhelm the mind of the warrior and leave only a beast- our strength untempered by discipline or force of will. It is... a creature of curse. A transformation from the feral touch of Leman Russ."

The wolf lord made it to shore. His armour was hanging off, and he began to thrash his way out of it. Fingers gripped impregnable ceramite plates and crushed it like plaster. The figure flexed and stretched to his full height, breaking seals as his build extended far beyond the confinement of his war gear. The faceplate creaked and bulged as something seemed to expand within. Hands reached up to pulled the helm off.

Hands covered in dense fur the colour of flint. Hands with long, yellowed claws curving from the tips.

When Temujin the Hun spoke next, his voice was awed and horror-struck in equal measure.

"It is Wulfen."

The powerful claws ripped the helmet away, and a snarling muzzle filled with teeth the size of hunting knives burst free, foam and spittle and fogged breath spraying from its mouth. Long ears ran back from blank eyes that burned with blind fury. The beast reared up, almost twice Amit's height. It even had more mass to it than the terminator. It was a vile hybrid of wolf and astartes, the murderous form shaped to stand tall on two legs with arms like a humans with their remorselessly sharp claws. Fur covered every inch of the creature's body of coiled muscle, sodden with bloody water, and its breath came in wrenched snarls as its focus fixed on the space marines.

Across its brow, runes of the dark forces scorched into existence, marking the beast's allegiance.

All Amit could do was look on as the monstrous glory was displayed for all to see. Pure shock robbed him of speech, held him in place- prevented him from responding in any way. But on the inside, he felt a swelling outrage the likes of which he had never felt before.

Wulfen! A gene-curse of the Space Wolves! All his life he'd struggled with his own burden of blood. Since the terrible battle of Signus Prime he'd shouldered the guilt and shame of giving into his rage and destroying Helik Redknife and his brother Space Wolves. And now, he found that the Space Wolves were no better than he! They carried their own curse, but had had the good fortune to have been able to keep it hidden, maintaining a façade of dignity while the likes of Amit and his brothers had been forced to endured suspicion and speculation for the ferocious natures they had no control over.

"Quickly, Flesh Tearer! You must act now; destroy the beast!"

Upon hearing Temujin's words, Amit's aggression was focussed solely on the rune priest rather than the beast.

"You dare call upon me to shield you from this shame! ?" Amit had the psyker by the neck in a heartbeat. "You brought me here to save you from the disgrace of this weakness becoming known, and said nothing of it! ?"

"This threat goes beyond my chapter's honour," Temujin spoke frantically. "This is the champion of Khorne. It cannot be allowed to go abroad. I have foreseen- the power to stop the Wulfen is in your grasp alone. The path of your atonement will lead you to stop it."

"And still you demand I die for your sake!" Amit threw the psyker from him.

"I have _seen_ it Flesh Tearer. I have already said- you must confront your _own_ evil before you can slay this evil. It is up to you!"

"Enough talk!" Tarugar roared from his high vantage point. "It is time for blood! Beast- _kill them_!"

The answering roar of the Wulfen rippled through the air until Amit felt it reverberating off his face. And then the beast was moving, charging Amit and Temujin, loping on all fours.

"Destroy it!"

This time Amit was forced to put aside his anger at the rune priest's command. His rage was needed for this battle. The chapter master thrust out his right arm and triggered the storm bolter.

A fiery string of mass reactive shells connected Amit to the beast. The thing that had been Ikuvium Whitewolf brayed under the hammering impacts of the bolts, but while explosions blossomed over its vast back and broad shoulders, they didn't wound nor even slow the thing. Its fortitude and killer instinct pushed it on against the pain, and before Amit had even let off two dozen rounds, the lupine was before him.

One massive hand slashed at the Flesh Tearer, smashing the storm bolter to pieces in a single blow. Such was the force of the strike that Amit was knocked off balance, his arm swinging wide. The beast leapt upon the opportunity, biting into Amit's exposed neck. The chapter master roared as teeth bit into the wounds caused by Beorc Eoh. His flesh tore, and it seemed like only seconds before the beast ripped his head off.

Then the Wulfen opened its mouth wide, pulling back to scream in pain as fingers of lightning licked over its flank and boiled flesh. Temujin the Hun joined the fight with his preternatural powers, but somehow the energy that had reduced World Eaters to little more than burnt husks only managed to hurt, and so enrage the beast. Already exhausted from the use of his powers, the rune priest's electrical assault burnt out quickly, and the Wulfen turned on him. Temujin brought his flail into play, sending the fiery mace head towards the beast, but the Wulfen snatched it out of the air and just growled as the blue flames dance over its arms ineffectively. Amit seized the chance to attack while the beast seemed distracted, but the wolf monster responded instantly by wrenching on the flail with such force that Temujin was pulled off his feet and shot forward. He collided with the Flesh Tearer and they both spilled onto the pebbled beach.

Temujin had just made it back to his feet when the Wulfen struck.

Crescent moon claws shredded the air and ripped away the rune priest's face. The warrior screamed in pain, all dignity forgotten as he clutched at the huge gash. A few fragments of the left side of his face remained, little more than a few scraps of skin and a single lidless eye, but it was not enough for Temujin to spot the second set of claws swinging though the air to thud into his abdomen, punching though armour as though it wasn't even there.

Amit, on his knees and recovering his wits, looked in time to see the Wulfen lift Temujin high, proudly displaying the screaming space marine as he writhed to pull himself free.

Against shock and injury, Amit pushed himself to his feet and darted forward to aid the stricken psyker. For all the anger and insult the rune priest had caused, Amit fought to save his life, wading into the battle, fisting his chaintonfas, trying to hack off the offending limb and give the Space Wolf a chance to stagger to safety. The grinding chainblades bounced off the Wulfen's arm without leaving any more than a graze. It retaliated with a backhanded swing that slapped into Amit's face and dazed him again. The Wulfen hurled Temujin away, leaving him to spin through the air and smack down on the ground. He was clearly out of the fight.

Both arms free, the beast threw itself at Amit. The Flesh Tearer crossed his tonfas before him, trying to hold off his assailant. The Wulfen slammed against the whirling teeth, ignoring the clumps of fur they ripped out as it slashed and pierced with its claws. The speed and violence of the attack was beyond anything Amit had ever encountered. There was no opening to make a counter strike, and he didn't dare drop his guard, for all the good it did him.

If just one of those furious blows made direct contact with his head or chest, he'd be dead instantly.


	8. Chapter 8

They fought on, the Flesh Tearer struggling to swing his blades in time to parry the lethal blows. Without the need for armour to protect it, the monstrously transformed wolf lord moved freely and quickly, breaking through Amit's guard far too often than he could afford, leaving wounds that bled profusely and sapped his strength. Amit's faced was creased with frustration. This was like no battle he'd ever fought- like no enemy he'd ever faced. He had slain ferocious animals, hordes of human soldiers, mutants, xenos, daemons- the Wulfen was nothing like any of them. It fought with ferocity and savage, instinctive skill, but also with all the precision and control of the space marine it had once been. It was the very incarnation of the beast. And like a beast, it had no thoughts of any grander scheme or goal beyond the immediate battle. It didn't overreach or make a misjudgement or show any sign of becoming restless. Its patience was absolute because it fought for nothing more than the sake of fighting. Amit, by contrast, felt the weight of the responsibility he carried with every blow he took- his responsibility to redeem himself by sparing the corrupted wolf lord and the Space Wolves from this dishonour and to undermine the World Eater's plans.

And now, his patience was giving way to desperation.

Amit attacked, adding offensive blows to his maneuverers, leaving more openings in his defence. Again, his blades only left minor wounds, whilst the Wulfen claws dug through his armour with impunity. Rage threatened to take control, burning him. Amit knew if he lost his composure now, he'd die.

And so the chapter master fought both enemies simultaneously, the Wulfen and the rage. The beast without and the beast within.

He smelt blood in the air- all his own- and agony lashed him as his armours pain suppressant reserves ran dry. Shame- of his inability to overcome this monster and of the debt he could not repay to the Space Wolves without this victory- fed back into his anger. The rage screamed in his mind, and for just a moment, Amit let it have its voice.

The Flesh Tearer thundered into the Wulfen with abandon. He shrugged off a deep gash in his shoulder slashed dangerously with his chaintonfas. The wolf beast swatted one blade clean out of his hand, but he kept a tight grip on the other as he brought it crashing down into the things collarbone. There was a lupine wail of agony, and a dozen or so bone fragments ricocheted of the Flesh Tearers armour, followed by a fountain of blood.

Amit's face was masked with a fanged grin. At last! A clean hit!

But then the elation came to an end as the Wulfen recovered far faster than Amit could have expected with a flurry of blows so devastating that the second tonfa buckled and died with an electronic whine, before being dragged out of his hands entirely and hurled away.

Amit threw a punch that would have dented a land raider. The beast slapped the huge power gauntlet away and struck. Its claws punctured the armour over Amit's belly and the Wulfen drove them in up to the knuckles. Before Amit could even grunt in pain, more claws were stabbing into his gorget, poking shallowly into his throat.

With a firm grip on the Flesh Tearer, the Wulfen lifted him overhead and, roaring in triumph, hurled the terminator to the ground. A buckshot wave of pebbles splashed from the impact point as the hallowed antique armour of the Blood Angels legion dug a crater in the shingle of Hippocampus and split with hairline cracks. A searing pain assailed Amit in his lower back, and he collapsed with nerve shock.

The world swam in and out of focus for the Flesh Tearer. With his mind in a haze the space marine felt as though he'd been left to drift for an eon, with only the thinnest sliver of lucidity to tell him it was only a moment. Disgusted with such weakness, Amit forced himself to rise back up from the fall to disorientation. It was like trying to swim against a tide- up a waterfall in fact.

But the anger was there.

The gene-curse gave Amit strength to push his way back to alertness. His mind cleared with the rush of pain and the rage boiled. He pushed the rage aside as best he could- now was not the time for such distractions.

Fully awake, Amit heard thunderous laughter overhead. It was Tarugar, jeering at the fallen Flesh Tearer whist his Wulfen slave hovered over Amit, salivating for the kill it longed to make.

"A worthy champion of Khorne, this beast," the skies rumbled and the waters churned at Tarugar's use of the blasphemous name. "And completely in my power thanks to those whose loyalty I command. The Wulfen will lead me to victory through thousands of wars to come, and all shall know that the Space Wolves are nothing more than pack dogs."

The Flesh Tearer looked to the monster. Nothing of the man it had been remained. It was a machine of nature, built to kill and nothing more.

And he could not defeat it!

'_By the Blood, is my life of so little value that even death will not bring me absolution?'_

Never in his life had Amit felt so helpless. So _hopeless_.

The chapter master closed his eyes and looked within himself for some strength he could bring to bear. Some strategy or idea; a fallen weapon he'd overlooked. He beseeched Sanguinius for strength. He prayed to the Emperor himself to find the strength within him.

All he found was anger.

Amit teetered close to despair. After all his years of service he was going to die a failure. There was nothing he could do to overturn this fate. Nothing he could use.

Just his anger.

It was a moment before Amit actually realised what he was considering, and when he did his blood turned to ice. He couldn't do that. Couldn't even think it. For his honour, he would gladly die. But to fall to the depths of damnation? To surrender his soul to his weakness- to his original sin?

_The Red Thirst… The Black Rage._

He could feel the power rippling beneath his skin. It yearned for release. But this was not to be the same fate that had befallen so many Blood Angels and their successor chapters; to be overcome by the gene-curse and live as a prisoner of the gene-seed's legacy in the Death Companies. That at least was a fate in service to the Emperor. The manifestation of the fury of Sanguinius.

No. The fate that called to Amit was a conscious acceptance of darkness. To abandon the free thought and sense of being that set the divine human apart from animals. It meant surrendering his will to his depraved cravings and calling upon its power to fight his battle. To be doomed to drain the blood from creatures as and where he found them like living carafes- to delight in the forbidden fruits of bloodlust, such as the Flesh Forged monstrosity Beorc Eoh-

- and Helik Redknife, the wolf lord.

Temujin the Hun's words called from his memory.

'You must confront your _own_ evil before you can slay this evil.'

Was it coincidence that the weakness that had led him to owe a debt to the Space Wolves was now the only weapon he had that could bring the wolf lord salvation?

"Now!" roared Tarugar "KILL HIM!"

And then Amit realised the truth in the rune priest's words. A truth he'd always known. Absolution always began with facing ones crime. How had he ever thought it would be otherwise?

"By the Blood…" Amit looked deep within himself for the darkness he'd resisted all his life, trapped behind the bulwarks of his willpower.

"And by the Emperor…"

The Wulfen's clawed hand swung down to tear Amit open. The astartes swung his own hand and caught the Wulfen's, faster than he even realised he was capable of.

"Die!"

And then the Flesh Tearer let his defences fall.

Everything went red for him. He heard the blood rushing in his ears like a gale. Felt the pulse of his hearts pounding like aftershocks through his body. All in all, the Flesh Tearer found himself in a state of peace. His head had been quite emptied of all thought. All he could sense was the steady flow of his rage leaving his mind, filling his body as it poured into his flesh and took its shape. Only a small part of him remained. His body still bore the appearance of Nassir Amit, but his body belonged to someone else.

It belonged to the Flesh Tearer.

Amit was vaguely aware of the Flesh Tearer, the expression of his bloodlust and rage, powering into the Wulfen's midst with a savagery that belied the wounds he'd taken. He dimly noticed his body overwhelming the beast's mindlessly direct instinctive fury with an insane, hateful ferocity. He tried to concentrate as the beast fell back- as it came apart under hands that had moments ago been his. But he couldn't. All Amit could do was float in the red haze.

Serenity, peace, calm- it was all he knew, now that he'd let the rage out.

He spotted the Wulfen through the all enshrouding calm. It was broken; dying. Amit tried to summon up an iota of triumph but couldn't manage it. He knew he should try to reign in the rage now. The beast was defeated and the battle won. But this peace he found himself…

With this new beast- the beast of his rage- on the outside, the peace in himself was so alluring. It would be so easy to let the beast free indefinitely and drift.

Duty burned in Amit's mind. His commitment to Emperor and chapter made him pause in his complacency- made him struggle against the serenity.

Then the Flesh Tearer bit down and tasted the Wulfen's blood, and Amit sank into serenity so deep he became aware of nothing else.


	9. Chapter 9

"No!" Tarugar roared as the terminator ripped out the Wulfen's throat with his teeth. "_NO!_"

But it was too late. His Space Wolf beast was dead, killed by the Flesh Tearer. All the time he'd spent on this wretched planet; the risk he'd taken in allowing the use of magick in the presence of the Bloodfather's power- all for nothing.

The rage surged through the Devourer, and he rounded on the one he could direct his rage at.

"Damn you, vagabond!" the World Eater quickly had Zol by the throat, acidic spittle spraying from his lips. "You promised me a champion beast to lead the way to war! Your works were for nothing! The monster lies dead and I stand defeated!"

Zol was completely unconcerned as Tarugar's lightning claws reactivated barely an inch from his face.

"You are not defeated, my lord Tarugar. Everything has happened as it was meant to."

"Let us see if forcing my claws through your head happens as its mea-"

"Observe, my lord. Your champion stands before you, awaiting your command."

The absurdity of the statement was enough to penetrate the Devourer's rage for a moment, just longer enough to make him glance in the direction of the Wulfen one more time.

And what he saw made him freeze.

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Rune Priest Temujin the Hun stirred gradually. His system was full of pain suppressants, but still the agony of his wounds blazed. Blood was seeping from ruptured organs and he could barely breathe through the gummy paste congealing over the gaps in his head that had once been a mouth and nose. He was dying, that much was clear. But through the pain he forced himself awake.

He had to see. He had to know the outcome of the battle.

He had to know if the Space Wolves were victorious.

He gazed about with a single dried up eyeball. All he could see was red. He strained harder to see, lifting his body even though it made his innards roll.

There! It was the Wulfen. It was dead, its body pulled open savagely like a mangled sack, face frozen in a howl of pain, eyes lifeless.

The rune priest's face twitched with a reflexive smile. The Wulfen was dead. The enemy had been denied their champion and the honour of Ikuvium Whitewolf and the Space Wolves was preserved.

Then there was a hand on his shoulder, roughly flipping him over to face the sky. The pain was terrific but he did not bother to respond. He was already dead. If the traitors wanted to take out the frustration of defeat upon him then so be it.

Then he saw the figure leaning over him, and his body that burned with pain froze in an instant.

Nassir Amit stood before him, devolved and bestial like some distant ancestor of humanity imbued with the gene-seed of the astartes. His eyes bulged with maniac intent, the veins in them swollen to bursting point. Perspiration beaded on his brow. A mane of tangled, sweat soaked blond hair had erupted from his scared scalp to hang to his shoulders. His lips were drawn back to reveal wicked fangs, and from his blood soaked maw, instead of the low and steady voice, came a rabid feline hiss.

The Flesh Tearer lunged forward, leading with his teeth. Temujin the Hun's screams of horror and pain were mercifully short lived.

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Tarugar could only grin as the Flesh Tearer savaged the Space Wolf mercilessly, lapping up the blood like he was dying of thirst.

"You have your champion of Khorne," brother Zol commented lightly as they began descending the steps of the foreman's tower.

"Aye. A savage and mindless beast," Tarugar laughed. "A dog of the Emperor!"

As they approached, the Flesh Tearer looked up at them with wild eyes.

"Blood!"

The beast rushed them barehanded. It dived for Tarugar, but the terminator battered the charge aside and knocked the Flesh Tearer to the ground.

"You will have blood at my pleasure, dog!"

"Blood! I need blood!" the creature's voice was delicate and the words well spoken; an echo of the ninth primarch.

"Do not speak to me, dog! The blood flows as I see fit! You kill at my command and no more. I am your master- Tarugar the Devourer. Kneel to me!"

The Flesh Tearer hesitated only for a moment. Then it fell to its knees. Fingers scratched at the ground franticly as the monster glared about.

Tarugar bared his teeth in another grin. All around his World Eaters were returning from wherever they'd fled to. One came right up to the warlord's left shoulder. The Devourer had no qualms about slicing off the coward's head without looking round. He ignored the falling body and took a step towards his beast, holding his claws high to allow blood to drip into the things grateful mouth- reward for its fealty.

As the beast drank, Zol approached and examined the left pauldron of its armour.

"Interesting," he said. "A Flesh Tearer."

Then Tarugar's free lightning claw lashed out and in a flurry of sparks the shoulder guard was pulverised, the chapter symbol erased completely.

"The filth of Sanguinius," Tarugar snarled. "That mark has no place in my war host."

Tarugar cast around and found a chain on the ground- it was the rune priest's force weapon. With a contemptuous sneer he grabbed it, squeezing the links until the delicate crystal bands inside that channelled a psykers power splintered into shards of tiny stars. He quickly ripped off a piece of the Flesh Tearer's armour and wrapped it around the beast's neck as a crude collar, affixing the chain by crushing the two metals into each other. Tarugar took a step back and regarded the sight of the former Blood Angel now on his knees, leashed and drooling for blood.

"Yes! A true dog of the Emperor!" Tarugar belly laughed.

"And a more suitable champion of Khorne than a magik bred beast. I think the red god would not have tolerated such a monster for long."

Tarugar turned narrowed eyes upon brother Zol. The traitor astartes' mood was unreadable behind that bland helmet, but the tilt of his head might just have implied a cunning smile. Wordlessly, Zol presented a weapon he had fashioned from the captured chainblades of Ikuvium Whitewolf- a two metre long chainglaive. It was strong and heavy. Zol visibly strained to hold his creation steady, but neither Tarugar nor the Flesh Tearer had any trouble as the Devourer snatched it with an approving nod and thrust it into the hands of his champion.

"This planet holds no more value for me. All of you, to the ships! There is much for us to do."

Tarugar began dragging the Flesh Tearer by its chain to the waiting dropships. As the World Eaters and the servitors under the direction of the Dark Mechanicum adept began gathering up the equipment and spoils to take back with them, brother Zol strolled casually after the warlord and his champion.

"Yes. There is much to do."

Four hours later and the battle for Hippocampus had ended in an Imperial victory. The Flesh Forged rabble holding the captured Imperial garrisons were overrun by the Flesh Tearers, and the World Eaters fled without even engaging in combat, returning to their warships and withdrawing from the space battle with the liberation fleet, before vanishing into the darkness.

**The End**


End file.
